why suddenly laser cutting with air compressor be popular?
Laser cutting is the use of high power density laser beam irradiation to cut the material, so that the material is quickly heated to the vaporization temperature, evaporation to form holes, along with the beam moving on the material, holes continuously form a very narrow width (such as about 0. 1m)slit, complete the cutting of the material
Laser cutting is widely used in sheet metal processing, metal processing, advertising production, kitchen utensils, automobiles, lamps and lanterns, saw blades, elevators, metarial crafts, textile machinery, grain machinery, glasses manufacturing, aerospace, medical equipment, instrumentation and other industries. Especially in the sheet metal processing industry has repl aced the traditional processing method, favored by industry users. Laser cutting accounts for more than 40% of the industrial laser processing and is the most important applied technology in the laser processing industry.
Before 2010, due to the high price of laser cutting equipment, a large format laser cutting machine (equipped with 4 kw laser) cost nearly 6 million yuan, the use of large format Iaser cutting machine in China is not many enterprises. After 2011, the domestic enterprise to develop the high power fiber laser cutting machine, because of the high power fiber laser machining has unique advantages, processing costs have fallen sharply, at the same time combined with a variety of flexible ways of payment, currently, more and more sheet metal processing enterprises, hutch defends manufacturing enterprises and automotive parts processing enterprises using the laser cutting machine. In recent years, laser processing equipment has been rapidly popularized. In 2017, the sales volume of complete laser cutting equipment in China exceeded 25,000.
In 2013, there were about 50-60 laser cutting equipment enterprises in China, while less than 20 were able to produce high-power products above 2, 000 watts. By the beginning of 2018, it is conservatively estimated that there are more than 400 laser cutting equipment enterprises in China, and more than 200enterprises capable of producing high-power products above 3, 000 watts.
Over the past decade, the laser cutting industry has experienced a series of changes, including cutting material quality and hickness of the ascension, machine power and high efficiency, so as to make the now of laser cutting machine can be at a higher speed, accuracy, and better quality of including automotive, aerospace, medical care, plastics, electrical and electronics, textiles, such as carpentry, countless parts processing in high efficiently.
In 2012, the comparison popularity of fiber optic laser cutting equipment is 2000 watts of power, in 2014 is 3000-4000 watts, many peopl think 4 kilowatts is enough to meet the majority of thicknes plate cutting and processing needs. However, in the second half of 2016, HAN'S laser first roll out 8 kw machines, triggering a new round of competition for high-power laser cutting. Nowadays, the major laser cutting manufacturers have been comparing for 12, 000 watts, 15, 000 watts of power products. It has to be admitted that laser products upgrade very quickly, the narket development is also rapidly changing.
In 2017, the global market size of laser processing equipment was 31.37 billion us dollars, up 12% year on year. In 2017, the total sales volume of China s laser equipment market exceeded 44.2 billion, with laser cutting equipment accounting for 46% of the market size of China s industrial laser processing equipment. Medium and small power laser cutting equipment market sales scale has maintained a high growth rate, the core laser achieved a high localization rate.
With the rapid growth of laser cutting equipment market, the air compressor which provides auxiliary air source for laser cutting machine has also attracted the attention of all circles.
Laser cutting machine can meet the cutting requirements of various material texture and complex shapes, in addition to the need to be able to provide high energy laser machine, auxiliary gas is an indispensable material to complete the cutting. The auxiliary gases used in laser cutting are mainly oxygen (02), nitrogen(N2)and compressed Air. Its main function, one is to cool to prevent the material from hardening, that is, by heat treatment The second is to take the pressure gas will cut the molten metal slag blowing, prevent the dust blocking the laser nozzle, protect and extend its service life.
Since the cost of nitrogen and oxygen is higher than that of compressed air, and the price of nitrogen and oxygen increases year by year, the use of air as cutting auxiliary gas can greatly reduce the production about half cost. In addition since air itself contains about 20% oxygen, it can make up for the shortage of oxygen and nitrogen to some extent. Cutting with compressed air instead of nitrogen is very economical and practical, saving the cost of one year gas is enough to buy three high-quality integrated laser air compressors. Therefore the use of compressed air as auxiliary gas cutting is becoming more and more common. which has also led to the rise of the market for special air compressors for laser cutting.
Matching laser cutting machine as the auxiliary gas of the size of the selection of air compressor specifications, the main laser cutting machine used by the design of the laser cutting head auxiliary gas pressure and nozzle size to determine, so as to get the best air compressor and laser cutting machine match.
At present, the laser cutting machine which needs more than 1.6Mpa compressed air mainly adopts piston compressor, but the devel opment is relatively slow due to the limitation of reliability and quality of piston compressor. Piston air compressors are easy to obtain high pressure, but piston air compressors are noisy, vulnerable parts, and the exhaust gas and oil content can not handled well. therefore, whe below 1.6Mpa, do not recommended to use piston air compressors. Screw type air compressor is generally recommended when below 1.6Mpa, and then suitable air dryer and precision filter are selected. The permanent magnet variable frequency motor is more suitable for the compressor, which can keep the air supply pressure stable and ensure the best cutting effect.
With the development of laser cutting machine power from smal power to medium power to large power to super power, the pressure requirement of the air compressor supporting laser cutting machine has also been increased from 8bar at the beginning to 13bar two years ago, then to 16bar now, and is developing become to 20-30bar. Therefore, it is necessary to develop a small flow and high pressure screw air compressor with rated discharge pressure as ≥2.0MPa.
Compressed air quality has a very direct effect on the quality of metal laser cutting, the size and stability of the gas pressure will affect the cutting effect. Laser cutting machine users generally with four air filters, or even five air filters, the purpose is to better protect the service life of laser cutting machine. If the water mist and oil contained in the compressed air are not treated cleanly, the high-pressure jet on the protection mirror of the laser cutting head will seriously affect the transmission of the laser beam, scatter the focus, resulting in the product can not be cut through resulting in waste. If it is a very large power laser cutting machine, as long as the protection mirror or nozzle surface adhere to a little very fine oil film or water mist, it may also cause high energy laser emission burned laser head
Since most users do not have the knowledge of air compressors and compressed air purification, if the users buy air compressors, storage tanks, air dryers and filters one by one and then install them by themselves, it will not only be troublesome, but probably the whole system will not meet the required compressed air quality requirements. Currently on the market, therefore, of the more popular way is to set the compressor, storage tanks, oil-water separator, air dryers and filter as a whole system, to provide laser cutting special one-piece air compressor package, to avoid the user since the gasholder, air dryers and filter, user installation and take over, need more suppliers providing services such as a variety of problems, it is an ideal choice. At present, there have been nearly ten compressor enterprises launched laser cutting special integral screw compressor products.
However, in recent years, although the domestic laser cutting machine technology has a breakthrough development, toward the direction of high power, high precision, large scale, but the power laser cutting machine compared with the development of low power laser cutting machine is later, more dependence on foreign imports. Moreover, since the price of the laser head of the ultra-powerful laser cutting machine (over 12,000 w)is over20, 000 yuan, and most air compressor providers cannot handle the oil and water in the compressed air well, most users of the ultra-powerful laser cutting machine are reluctant to take the risk of using compressed air as the auxiliary gas. So, to laser cutting of the compressor, the industry needs to breakthrough not only provide clean compressed air is based on the needs of users, has no oil or water, to reduce the cost, stable performance, convenient operation and other aspects. The market positively, change inherent habits of thinking, the user for the compressor to expand a broader market in the field of laser cutting.
In the context of intelligent manufacturing in China, the industrial sector is undergoing a transformation from traditional processing to high-end manufacturing, and the market scale of laser cutting in China will always maintain a high-speed development trend. In this context, believing that screw compressor in the field of laser cutting manifestation will be very exciting.